Sunday, April 1, 2012

The stress of being a professor has been absolutely brutal on me. With the teaching prep, grant proposals, research group management, departmental/professional service, and all the other things I do - I really feel like my head is going to explode. I can't think of a time I've ever felt this stressed, except maybe as an undergraduate in college, or when I had a colicky newborn.

Since it's generally not socially acceptable for professional women to show any emotions other than joy, I started taking my work stress out on bread. As soon as I get home, off goes the smile and out comes the flour. I douse the counter, grab all my ingredients, add water, and knead. They say 8-10 minutes, I usually go for 30-40. To me the end product is not so much about making a delicious, well-proportioned, beautiful loaf of bread as it is about beating the crap out of my enemies.

About six months ago, after a particularly bad day at the office, I decided to start making my dough resemble particularly troublesome colleagues before I kneaded the heck out of it. At first it was just little motifs here and there - a jutted chin, a moustache, glasses. Then I started getting more elaborate, with different kinds of food dye for the hair and eyes, sprinkles for whiskers, etc.

I got pretty good at these "bread sculptures". In fact, so good, that I couldn't bear to destroy them. The best thing I could do was bake them, photograph them, then place them on the porch for the small animals to nibble upon.

Here's the thing: I *love* this. I enjoy bread sculpting so much, I can't imagine doing anything else with my life. This professor thing is just a sham, a veil hiding my eyes from the real world: the world of people-shaped bread.

So I told my chair I needed a leave of absence for "personal reasons" (I suspect he thinks I'm pregnant). I went down to the bank, took out a small business loan, and rented a store in the center of town.

I can imagine you as one of those discontents with life who get up and start a pastry company after years in academia. Too bad Oprah has cancelled her show....or you would have been a millionaire expert on bread sculpting for the "soul".

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The image in the banner is "Women Wiring the ENIAC", and is a US Army Archival Photograph in the public domain. The biography image is a sketch of Ada Lovelace, and to the best of my knowledge is in the public domain.